l3 



m 



^enc; 
ilical Science Reviev 



NOVEMBi; 



CONSTITUTIONAL LAW IN 1910-1911 523 

the Sherman Anti-Trust Act in the future. Such a course, 
however useful, carries with it perils. More than half a century 
ago the same court, for patriotic reasons, gave its views upon 
certain other very different matters not actually before it; and 
the resultant public criticism of the court is regretted by lawyers 
to this day. That case was Dred Scott v. Sandford.^' Ahsit 
omen. 

n 19 Howard, 393. 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE 
QUESTION.! 

WILLIAM T. LAPRADE. 

Trinity College, Durham, N. C- 

Bibliographical Note. — Obviously it is impossible to give a definite 
authority for many of the statements made in an article of this sort. 
I have, for the most part, therefore, omitted any footnotes whatever. 
Naturally I have used such standard works as Lecky, whose chapters 
on Irish questions I have found to be based on a more thorough re- 
search than those dealing with purely British affairs, and Morley's 
Gladstone. I have consulted, as well, the various parhamentary pa- 
pers and reports relating to the Home Rule bills of 1886, 1893, and 
1912. One of the most useful expositions of Mr. Asquith's bill is the 
series of papers edited for the Eighty Club by Prof. J. H. Morgan, 
and recently published under the title, "The New Irish Constitution." 
I need scarcely mention that I have referred to Dicey 's "England's 
Case Against Home Rule" and "A Leap in the Dark"; the Earl of 
Dunraven's "The Legacy of Past Years"; G. Locker Lampson's "A 
Consideration on the State of Ireland in the Nineteenth Century"; 
Justin H. McCarthy's "The Case for Home Rule"; Sidney Brooks' 
"Aspects of the Irish Question"; Harold Begbie's "The Lady Next 
Door"; R. Barry O'Brien's "Life of Charles Stewart Parnell," "Dub- 
lin Castle and the Irish People," "Two Centuries of Irish History," 
"Home Rule Speeches of John Redmond," and other similar works. 
But the greater part of the material on which this article is based has 
been gathered from current newspapers and magazines and from per- 
sonal observation in the course of my residence in England during 
the past three or four summers. 

It is one of the commonplaces in the history of Europe in the 
nineteenth century that the two most striking characteristics 
observable in the political changes of that period are an asser- 
tion, on the one hand, of the right of a much larger proportion 
of the people than formerly to a share in the government and, 
on the other, the rise and persistence of what may be termed a 
spirit of nationality. Both of these forces were entirely ignored 
by the diplomats who assembled at Vienna in 1814-1815, but 

» For a further analysis of the pending Home Rule Bill see the note of Professor 
Shepard in the "Notes on Current Legislation" in this issue. 

524 






THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 525 

a combination of the two was destined to work almost a com- 
plete overthrow of the system inaugurated by that Congress. 
The Revolutionary and Napoleonic wars no doubt intensified 
the national consciousness already existing in England, but 
their influence in this direction was naturally felt to a much 
greater extent in such Continental countries as Spain and 
Prussia. In England, indeed, these wars had a decidedly reac- 
tionary effect on the movement toward popular government. 
It is not exaggerating to say that they delayed the reform of 
the parliamentary representation and the extension of the suf- 
frage for more than a quarter of a century. But, after the 
movement for reform got under way again in England, English- 
men became increasingly liberal in their sympathies. Thence- 
forward aspiring Continental nationalities counted with good 
reason on a sympathetic hearing by a large and influential party 
of the English people. Greeks, Italians, Hungarians, Poles, 
and Bulgarians, in turn, found it not difficult to gain British 
good will in support of their causes. Indeed, Great Britain, 
ere long, came to look upon herself as a sort of international 
apostle of liberty and nationality. During all of this time, 
beginning with the very first year of the century and continu- 
ing to the present day. Great Britain has herself been a con- 
spicuous violator of the principle which has met with her 
sympathy when maintained by Continental peoples. An Irish 
national spirit still survives in spite of more than a century of 
effort to destroy it, first by hostile measures and later by kind- 
ness. This is a noteworthy fact, because it signifies that the 
fight of the Irish for self-government must be considered as a 
part of the political movement which has contributed so 
materially to shape the character of the German Empire, the 
kingdom of Italy, and in fact nearly every European ndtion. 

Naturally those who are opposed to Home Rule deny the 
correctness of this view. Mr. Balfour, the late leader of the 
Unionist party, asserts that ''all this talk of restoring to Ire- 
land Irish institutions, and of governing Ireland according to 
Irish ideas, has no historic basis whatever." There is an ele- 
ment of both truth and falsehood in this statement. A review 



526 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

of the salient facts in Irish history pertaining to this contro- 
versy will make that point clear. We need not deal here in 
precise definitions of nationality, and we may safely take no 
account of the disputed existence of a national spirit in Ireland 
previously to the advent of the English. It profits little to 
test medieval institutions by the standards of the present day. 
Besides, although it is unquestionably rooted in the events of 
earlier years, the demand for Home Rule with which the British 
Parliament is now attempting to deal is preeminently a prod- 
uct of the nineteenth century. 

There is not space here to trace the course of the disputes 
between England and Ireland from the passage of Poyning's 
Act in the latter part of the fifteenth century to its repeal in 
the latter part of the eighteenth. Yet it is impossible to get 
a clear understanding of the present situation in Ireland with- 
out some knowledge of the reasons why the Irish fought to main- 
tain this law against the demands of the Tudors and then raised 
rebellion to secure its repeal in the closing years of the American 
Revolutionary War. This law, which provided that Irish legis- 
lation should originate in Ireland, be transmitted to England 
and approved by the English Privy Council, and finally be acted 
upon by the Irish Parliament, was an effectual check on the 
schemes of Henry VIII and Elizabeth. But the democratizing 
influences of the seventeenth century had operated to transform 
the Parliament that Grattan dominated into a more self-asser- 
tive body. England was now at the end of a disastrous war 
and was, therefore, not in a position to resist the demands of 
the Volunteer bands that supported Grattan. The result was 
the ill-fated experiment which lasted from 1782 until Pitt put 
an end to it in 1801. 

Whether Grattan's Parliament, as it is called, would under 
different conditions have furnished a basis for the permanent 
settlement of the Irish question will always be a disputed point. 
Certainly no ship of state was ever launched under less au- 
spicious circumstances or sailed a stormier sea. The British 
administration that sanctioned it fell almost immediately after- 
ward, and the reins of the English government were held by 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 527 

three different factions within the next two years. Whatever 
liberal views toward Ireland Pitt, the leader of the party that 
ultimately triumphed, had were vitiated by the attitude of the 
Irish Parliament toward the Regency dispute in 1788. True 
he promoted the Catholic relief act of 1793, a measure that 
looked toward the preservation of Irish nationality. But this 
act, though accepted by the Protestant ruling faction, was re- 
ceived with little enthusiasm by the friends of the minister. 
And the disturbances incidental to the French war, culminat- 
ing in the uprising of 1798, caused Pitt to support the project 
for a union of the two countries with the result that it was con- 
summated by means that only an extremely desirable end could 
justify. The notorious character of the methods by which it 
was accomplished naturally served to make the union unpopu- 
lar in Ireland and contributed to stir the national self-conscious- 
ness that was destined ultimately to voice a demand that the 
act of union be repealed. 

But this is far from saying that the Irish now desire a revival 
of Grattan's Parliament, though none of the projects for Home 
Rule brought forward in recent years involve as complete a 
separation from England as was granted by the Rockingham 
Whigs in 1782. Nor is it so paradoxical as it seems that the 
ruling class in Ireland under the old regime, the party that was 
most persistent in its opposition to the Union, should now be 
fanatical in its opposition to the restoration of Home Rule. 
Native Irishmen had little voice in Grattan's Parliament, which 
represented only the Protestant minority, who were for the 
most part descendants of the English and Scotch who had crossed 
over in the course of the seventeenth century disputes. Never- 
theless, there are indications that it might have been possible in 
the decade preceding the act of union to reconcile the discord- 
ant elements in the Irish population. The Protestants as- 
sented to the act of 1793 which gave Catholics a right to vote 
for members of Parliament on the same terms with themselves. 
And they offered no serious objections to Fitzwilliam's pro- 
posal in 1795 to extend those privileges so as to enable Catho- 
lics to sit in Parliament. The vetoing of this scheme by the 



528 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

British cabinet did much itself to create distrust in the Catho- 
lics. And when Pitt, because of the obstinacy of George III 
or because of less meritorious characteristics in some of his ad- 
visers, was unable to fulfil the promise of emancipation which 
he had made in order to win the support of the Catholics for 
the union, any reconciliation of the two peoples under the same 
government was made well-nigh hopeless. 

George III lived much too long for the good of his country, 
and George IV inherited his father's prejudices concerning the 
Catholic question without many of his better qualities. Be- 
tween them they managed to delay the relief Pitt had promised 
the Catholics till 1829. Therefore, when emancipation did 
come, it was impossible for a half measure to overcome the 
antagonism to British rule which years of coercion had aroused 
in the Irish. And emancipation, even to this day, has not given 
Catholics a proportionate share of authority in the Irish govern- 
ment. They outnumber the Protestants three or four to one, 
yet, according to a recent estimate, only three of the seventeen 
judges in the high court of justice, eight of the twenty-one county 
court judges and recorders, five of the thirty-seven county in- 
spectors of police, 62 of the 202 district inspectors of police, 
and 1,805 of the 5,518 ordinary justices of peace are Catholics. 
Since these conditions exist after nearly a century of emanci- 
pation there is little wonder that the Irish persist in their 
demand that they be allowed to choose their own rulers. 

Moreover, the English government has shown a singular 
want of tact in dealing with the other grievances of which the 
Irish have complained. There is not space here to enter into 
details, but in the first three quarters of a century after the 
union not many years passed without some legislative or ex- 
ecutive action designed for the coercion of the Irish, while reme- 
dial measures were either neglected entirely or delayed so long 
that they failed to have the desired concihatory effect. In 
fact, almost every remedial measure granted in the course of 
that time was won as the fruit of Irish rebellion or disorder. 
O'Connell in 1835 undertook to adopt a different poUcy and 
helped Lord John Russell turn out Peel's government in the 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 529 

hope of securing a settlement of the tithe question, at that time 
the chief grievance put forward by the Irish. Three years 
later Lord John himself accepted a measure similar to the one 
Peel had proposed and because of which Lord John had been 
able to defeat him. The movement for the repeal of the act 
of union, the trial of O'Connell, and the rise of the Young Ire- 
landers followed. The land question next claimed attention, 
but the British Parliament refused to take it seriously or to 
grant relief until the Fenian Society procured the disestablish- 
ment of the Irish church in 1869 and the passage of the land 
act of 1870 by bringing Ireland to a state of open rebellion. 
Other land acts followed in 1881, 1885, 1887, 1888, 1889, 
1891, 1896, 1903, 1907, and 1909. The Unionist party has 
become as enthusiastic as the Liberal in supporting this move- 
ment to restore land to the peasant tenantry. Unionists argue 
that the demand for Home Rule was a product of the hard- 
ships resulting from the old system of land tenure and conse- 
quently that the desire for Home Rule will not long survive 
after these hardships are relieved. The several land acts have 
certainly contributed much to benefit the Irish peasants, but 
they have apparently so far made little impression on the senti- 
ment in favor of Home Rule. 

The natural effect of this long period of unsuccessful repres- 
sion was to intensify the national consciousness of the Irish. 
The immediate success of the Home Rule Association, when 
it was organized in 1870, is, therefore, not in the least surpris- 
ing. The new party returned fifty-nine members to Parlia- 
ment in 1874, sixty-one in 1880, and eighty-five in 1885, around 
which figure the Nationalist representation in the House of 
Commons has since remained. The object of the party thus 
formed, as set forth in the resolutions of the original association, 
is to obtain for Ireland a Parliament of her own and to ''secure 
for that Parliament, under a federal arrangement, the right of 
legislating for, and regulating all matters relating to the inter- 
nal affairs of Ireland, and control over Irish resources and ex- 
penditure, subject to the obligation of contributing our just 
proportion of the Imperial expenditure." This organization, 



530 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

under the successive leadership of Butt, Parnell, and Redmond, 
has fought the battle for Home Rule to its present stage, and 
much of the ground necessary to ultimate victory has certainly 
been won. For example, it is something to have Mr. Asquith, 
the first prime minister to visit Dublin while in office since the 
union, declare recently to an Irish audience in the Irish capital 
that Ireland is a ''nation." And if a century of history is any 
test of nationality it is impossible not to agree with that con- 
clusion, a conclusion which places the movement for Home 
Rule in the list of struggles for self-government and national 
existence of which the nineteenth century affords so many 
examples. 

Either the failure of every other measure to conciliate the 
Irish or, as Unionists will have it, the political situation result- 
ing from the general election of 1885 converted Gladstone to 
the Home Rule policy and gave rise to the abortive Home Rule 
bill of 1886. The result was division and temporary disaster 
to the Liberal party. In 1893 another bill was introduced and 
carried through the House of Commons only to meet defeat 
in the House of Lords. Obviously here was another lion that 
had to be removed from the way before the Nationalists could 
hope to bring their plan to final accomplishment. Luckily for 
them the House of Lords gave to Liberals as many grounds of 
complaint as it gave to Nationalists. In consequence, means 
for avoiding this hitherto insurmountable barrier to Liberal 
legislation was sought in that very conservative though much 
abused measure, the Parliament Act of 1911. The road having 
been cleared of the obstruction that blocked the way in 1893, 
another Home Rule bill has been introduced into Parliament 
and is now pending. Is there any probability that this bill 
will pass into law? Should it pass, is it calculated to solve the 
Irish problem? We shall consider these questions in reverse 
order. 

Briefly stated, the Irish problem is as follows. Geographi- 
cally, England and Ireland are near to each other and yet not 
contiguous. As Grattan finely put it, the ocean on one side of 
Ireland protests against separation from England, while the 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 531 

sea on the other side protests against union. Historically, the 
efforts to join in a legal organic union two peoples that have 
fundamentally different racial and religious characteristics, after 
more than a century of trial, cannot be said to have been con- 
spicuously successful. At present an overwhelming majority of 
the Irish people are organized into a political party for the pur- 
pose of demanding a larger measure of self-government for their 
country. Other issues are subordinated to this one, and there 
seems to be no present prospect that Irish opinion concerning 
other questions can find expression at the polls until the ques- 
tion of Home Rule is finally determined. Nor can this be 
termed a mere temporary ebullition of national spirit. Begin- 
ning its organized form more than forty years ago the present 
movement has gained rather than lost ground. The only ele- 
ment of the population that is opposed to Home Rule is alien 
both in race and religion to the native Irishmen. The testi- 
mony of both history and geography would seem, therefore, to 
be on the side of the Nationalists. 

But it is one thing to assert the general proposition that Ire- 
land ought to have Home Rule. To devise a workable scheme 
of government that will combine in the right proportions the 
measure of local autonomy and imperial unity that all advo- 
cates of Home Rule profess to desire is quite a different matter. 
Take the question of the legislature, for example. If the Irish 
are to have a parliament at Dublin to regulate their local affairs, 
ought they also to have representatives in the parliament that 
will regulate, along with imperial concerns, the local affairs of 
England and Scotland? Yet, if Ireland is denied this privilege, 
she is denied a voice in the legislature which, under every scheme 
of government that has hitherto been suggested, will impose 
certain of her taxes. Gladstone contributed little toward the 
settlement of this problem, which is one of the most trouble- 
some that the Irish business presents. In 1886 he proposed 
that the Irish should be deprived entirely of their representa- 
tion at Westminster. By 1893 he had decided that it would 
be sufficient to cut down their representation to eighty mem- 
bers, though he was still in doubt as to whether these members 



532 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

ought to have a voice in the determination of matters that re- 
lated solely to Great Britain. Mr. Asquith and his colleagues 
have compromised the question by reducing the number of 
Irish members to forty-two. There is still a possibility that the 
Irish vote may hold the balance of power and turn out a British 
administration on a purely British question. But in the nature 
of things such an event is scarcely likely to occur. In the first 
place, ministries are not usually overthrown on purely local 
questions. Then, too, it is unlikely that the Irish, voting as 
a body, will take the responsibility of defeating a ministry 
on a matter of that sort. 

Not the least knotty question that confronts the framers of 
a Home Rule bill is the settlement of the financial relations 
between the two countries. In 1886 Gladstone proposed to 
give to Ireland complete autonomy in the levying of all taxes 
except customs and excise. The post office was to be trans- 
ferred to the Irish Government whenever it should be demanded. 
The collection of all taxes, however, was to remain in the hands 
of the imperial government. At that time there was a consid- 
erable surplus in the revenues collected in Ireland over the 
expenditure for Irish services, and Gladstone proposed that 
Ireland should contribute one fifteenth of the total charges for 
imperial expenditure. In 1893 there was still a surplus of Irish 
revenue over local expenditure, and Gladstone again proposed 
that Ireland should make a contribution to the imperial excheq- 
uer. In this bill, however, he proposed simply to retain the 
total product of the Irish customs for imperial purposes, with 
the provision that the imperial government should defray the 
expenses of the Irish constabulary in as far as they exceeded 
£1,000,000. For the first six years after the passage of the act 
the imperial government was to continue to collect all taxes 
in existence at that time and any additional ones that the Irish 
Parliament might levy. After the expiration of six years all 
taxes except customs and excise were to be imposed and col- 
lected by the Irish government, which was also to collect the 
excise levied by the imperial parliament. 

Mr. Asquith, in his Government of Ireland Bill of 1912, has 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 533 

adopted a system differing radically from either of those pro- 
posed by Gladstone. The social and agrarian measures recently 
set on foot in Ireland by the British parliament have changed 
the surplus in the Irish revenues to a deficit. The question is 
no longer how much Ireland can contribute to imperial expendi- 
ture but how much the British exchequer must contribute to 
Ireland. In 1895-6 the 'Hrue"i Irish revenue was estimated 
at £8,034,000, in 1910-11 at £10,300,000, an increase of 
£2,226,000. In the same years the local expenditure in Ireland 
increased from £5,938,000 to £11,344,000; so that, whereas in 
1895-6 Ireland contributed to the imperial exchequer the sum 
of £2,066,000, in 1910-11 she was a burden on the empire to 
the extent of £1,044,000. In view of these facts, Mr. Asquith 
proposes that for the present Ireland shall have only a partial 
autonomy in the matter of finance. An Irish exchequer and an 
Irish consolidated fund are to be established and an Irish audi- 
tor general appointed. But the imperial government will re- 
tain the duty of imposing and collecting taxes. The manner 
in which the financial obligations of the two kingdoms will be 
apportioned can perhaps best be illustrated by taking some one 
year for an example. In 1912-13, for instance, it is estimated 
that the true Irish revenue will amount to £10,839,000. In 
addition to this sum the imperial exchequer will for three years 
contribute £500,000, to be gradually diminished at the end 
of that period, making a total income of £11,339,000. It is 
proposed to transfer £7,562,000 of this sum, including the postal 
revenue, to the Irish exchequer for Irish use. The remainder 
is to be retained in the hands of the imperial government and 
apportioned among the reserved services, which include old 
age pensions, national insurance and labor exchanges, land pur- 
chase, the constabulary, and the collection of the revenue. This 
budget is not to be affected by alterations in imperial taxation. 
The Irish parliament, on the other hand, can increase taxes to 
get additional revenue or diminish them and have the decrease 
in returns substracted from the amount transferred to the Irish 

»The "true" revenue does not include the amount collected in Ireland on goods 
consumed in England. 



534 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

exchequer. The Irish parHament cannot for the present, how- 
ever, impose taxes on articles not taxed by the imperial parlia- 
ment, and its additions to the income-tax, death duties, or 
customs must not exceed ten per cent, of the existing rate. Fur- 
thermore, should the Irish parliament differentiate the custom 
or excise duties in the two countries it must provide a corre- 
sponding differential on goods passing from one country to the 
other. But these provisions are, in large part, to be temporary. 
The constabulary is to be transferred automatically to the Irish 
government after six years. The Irish parliament will also 
have the right, on twelve months' notice, to take over the man- 
agement of old age pensions and national insurance. The land 
purchase scheme, it seems, is to remain permanently in the 
control of the imperial government. Any normal increase in 
the Irish revenue is to be applied to the eradication of the deficit 
against the imperial exchequer. Whenever this deficit shall 
have been entirely wiped out and shall not have reappeared 
for the space of three years, further arrangements are to be 
made concerning the collection of Irish taxes and Irish contri- 
bution to imperial expenditure. Such, in brief, are the finan- 
cial provisions of Mr. Asquith's bill. Only actual experience 
can determine whether they are workable. 

The third perplexing task in framing a Home Rule bill is the 
provision of safeguards for Ulster. The question of Ulster is 
much more easily understood than settled. Belfast, the metrop- 
olis of the north of Ireland, and its environs are peopled largely 
by descendants of Englishmen and Scots who migrated thither 
in the seventeenth century and w^ho are still zealous adherents 
to the religion of their fathers. The native Irish population is 
predominantly Roman Catholic. In other sections of Ireland 
recent observers agree that a spirit of friendliness and toleration 
prevails between Catholics and Protestants. But in Ulster the 
old intolerance persists with much of its ancient violence. Glad- 
stone, therefore, in both of his bills provided elaborate limita- 
tions to prevent an Irish, and therefore a Catholic, parliament, 
from infringing on the rights of their Protestant fellow-country- 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 535 

men. Mr. Asquith has attempted to solve the same problem 
in a much shorter clause, which provides that : 

''In the exercise of their power to make laws under this act 
the Irish parliament shall not make a law so as either directly 
or indirectly to establish or endow any religion, or prohibit the 
free exercise thereof, or give a preference, privilege or advantage, 
or impose any disability or disadvantage, on account of relig- 
ious belief or religious or ecclesiastical status, or make any re- 
ligious belief or religious ceremony a condition of the validity 
of any marriage." Unionists deny that it will be possible to 
enforce these safeguards. And it cannot be gainsaid that unless 
a different spirit is shown than seems at present to exist in Bel- 
fast it will be difficult to prevent Catholics from resorting to 
retaliatory measures. 

As regards the machinery of the proposed Irish government 
itself not much can be said here. There is to be a bicameral 
legislature with a responsible executive expressly provided for 
by law. The Lord Lieutenant will, of course, also be responsi- 
ble to the British cabinet. He is to have a twofold veto power 
over the acts of the Irish legislature. If he should be in doubt 
as to the constitutionality of a measure he is empowered to 
refer it forthwith to the judicial committee of the Privy Council, 
which is to be the Irish court of last resort. Acting on the ad- 
vice of the imperial cabinet he may also veto a bill from motives 
of policy; but it remains to be seen how far this power will be 
exercised. The Irish legislature itself is to consist of two 
houses, one of which will be elected by the people and will be 
supreme in matters of finance after the fashion of the British 
House of Commons. The Senate, or upper house, is to consist 
of forty members nominated by the Lord Lieutenant for eight 
years. In case of the disagreement of the two houses on a leg- 
islative matter, when the Senate shall have twice rejected a 
measure passed by the House of Commons, the two houses shall 
meet together and by a joint vote finally dispose of the question. 
The Irish legislature is to be granted the power to make laws 
for the ''peace, order, and good government of the kingdom." 
It should not be forgotten, however, that the imperial parlia- 



536 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

ment, in the plenitude of its legislative powers, can pass laws 
contrary to those passed by the Irish parliament, and in case 
of a conflict the decision would undoubtedly be in favor of the 
imperial law. The supremacy ot the imperial legislature is 
specifically maintained in the bill, though that provision was 
scarcely necessary in view of the unlimited scope of the powers 
of the British parliament. Moreover, the Irish parliament will 
not be able to legislate extra-territorially, and a number of sub- 
jects are excepted from its purview entirely, such as the suc- 
cession to the Crown, making war .or peace, the army and navy, 
dignities and titles of honor, treason and alienage, navigation 
and merchant shipping, copyright and trade-marks, coinage, 
and several other subjects of a similar character. The wonder 
is, perhaps, that there is not a greater number of exceptions. 
Company and factory acts, for example, might very well have 
been kept uniform for the British Isles. 

Mr. Asquith frankly proposes his bill as the first step in a 
more extensive scheme of devolution that is designed to transfer 
to Scotland and Wales as well as to Ireland the management 
of their local affairs. Nevertheless, many advocates of this 
scheme deny that they favor the introduction of the federal 
principle into the government of Great Britain and Ireland. 
They disagree with the contention of Professor Dicey and main- 
tain that it is one thing for a sovereign parliament to delegate 
certain of its duties to local legislatures and quite another for 
previously sovereign states to unite for the purpose of estab- 
lishing a strong central government. In the first case the impe- 
rial parliament would retain its supreme legislative powers, as 
it does under the Government of Ireland Bill, and would merely 
transfer to the local legislatures powers which, being composed 
of members better acquainted with local conditions, they could 
exercise more advantageously than the imperial parliament 
itself. The advocates of this theory insist that their scheme 
does not limit in the least the present absolute power of the 
imperial parliament, since the power to create implies also the 
power to destroy the creature. By this argument they meet 
the objections of those who complain that this decentralization 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 537 

of the government will weaken the empire. Their scheme, 
they maintain, makes it possible to satisfy the national aspira- 
tions of the inhabitants of the different parts of the kingdom, 
to secure for each part a better local administration than it has 
at present, and yet to preserve the unity of the empire and the 
supremacy of the imperial government. 

But, after all, the most interesting question at present con- 
cerning the Government of Ireland Bill is whether it has any 
chance of becoming a law in the near future. As regards this 
question, any prophecy at the present juncture would be rash. 
Nevertheless, there are some facts which can be stated with 
reasonable certainty and which are worthy of the attention 
of students of current politics. One of the most evident of 
these facts is that the majority of Englishmen no longer get 
excited about the question. True enough a certain class of 
Unionist leaders are using strong, not to say violent and dis- 
courteous, language in the newspapers, on the platform, and 
even on the floor of the House of Commons. But as far as the 
results have been expressed in votes they cannot be said to tell 
very strongly against Home Rule. The administration has 
lost sm^eral seats at recent by-elections and has held others by 
decreased majorities, as the administration of the day usually 
does. But in none of these contests have the Unionists shown 
a disposition to feature Home Rule as an issue, except perhaps 
in Manchester. But since 1903 the voters of that city have 
developed the habit of returning Liberal members in general 
elections, when there is a possibility that the election of a Union- 
ist member might mean the success of the policy of protective 
tariffs, and Unionists in by-elections, when "free trade" is not 
in danger. Much water has passed under the bridges since 
1886, even since 1893, and there is every indication that in the 
meantime the view that some measure of Home Rule is the 
only possible solution of the Irish question has gained ground 
in Great Britain until it now commands the approval of a 
majority of the voters. The most rabid Unionist leaders them- 
selves complain of the apathy of their followers. An exami- 
nation of the arguments used by the leaders of the parties that 



538 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

support the rival policies will make clearer the reasons for the 
existence of this apathy. 

Since they are proposing a change from the present system, 
we naturally consider first the arguments of those who favor 
Home Rule as an imperial policy. Before entering upon that 
subject, however, perhaps it would be well to remark that a 
great many Unionists appear to be perfectly serious in their 
belief that the Liberal party is not at present influenced in its 
action by these arguments. The Asquith administration could 
certainly not command a majority in the House of Commons 
without the support of the Irish Nationalists. Unionists, there- 
fore, say, and apparently believe, that the prime minister and 
his colleagues have ''sold themselves for place," and that they 
do not really believe in the measures they are supporting. It 
would be a mistake, however, to take this view too seriously. 
Even though we could believe the ministers, who are admitted 
by many Unionists to be a more able group of men than those 
who occupy the front opposition bench, to be so entirely devoid 
of political scruples, it is impossible to conclude that all their 
eminent supporters out of office, publicists, journalists, and the 
like, are also of that character. We are obliged to believe, 
therefore, that the arguments used by the advocates of Home 
Rule represent the actual opinions of a considerable number of 
English people. 

We need not consider the historic grievances of the Irish. 
They are admitted by both parties. The difference of opinion 
concerns the character of the remedy that ought to be adopted. 
Those who favor the policy of Home Rule maintain that the 
last century and a half, and particularly the last half-century, 
has for various reasons seen the rise of a national spirit in Ire- 
land which cannot be ignored and ought not to be suppressed 
if such a thing were possible. They argue that the obvious 
course to pursue is to recognize this nationalism as a fact and 
to grant to the Irish a large measure of autonomy, though at 
the same time preserving the supremacy of the imperial parlia- 
ment. Those who hold this view believe, moreover, that this 
policy will serve to bring the English and Irish peoples closer 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 539 

together, and that the empire would gain a more loyal support 
from Ireland with Home Rule than it ever can from an Ireland 
governed by coercion and held by force to an unpopular union. 
Those who favor the policy of Home Rule say, in the third place, 
that social conditions in Ireland are different in many respects 
from those in England and, therefore, that the two countries 
require a correspondingly different legislative and executive 
treatment. Manifestly, in that case, natives of Ireland, in- 
heriting the traditions of the country and conversant with its 
peculiar problems, would be more likely to deal wisely with 
these questions than statesmen who regard them rather as pes- 
tiferous incidents to a larger task than as matters of prime im- 
portance. Finally, those who favor the policy of Home Rule 
argue, and bring facts to support their contention, that the 
imperial legislature is at present overworked and that if the 
general problems of the empire are to receive the attention they 
deserve, questions of a local character will have, in the course 
of time, to be delegated to local legislatures created for that 
purpose. In view of the widespread demand for such a legis- 
lature in Ireland, they argue that the present is an auspicious 
time and Ireland an eminently proper place to begin the inevi- 
table process of devolution. 

Now these are arguments of undeniable weight, and we natu- 
rally expect to find those who favor the maintenance of the 
union offering arguments equally worthy of consideration in 
support of their view. In 1886 or in 1893 we should not have 
been disappointed in that expectation. Those who took their 
■cue from Dicey 's ''England's Case Against Home Rule" and 
^'A Leap in the Dark," and similar works may not in every 
case have been justified in their inferences or correct in their 
theories ; but they at least had the merit of approaching a diffi- 
cult question in a sane and dignified manner. Only the blindest 
partizan can say as much for the leaders of the present opposi- 
tion to Home Rule. Of course there are still many Unionists 
whose convictions are based on considerations that have to do 
with the larger interests of the empire. But arguments of this 
character seldom or never come from those who sit on the pres- 



540 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

exit opposition front bench in the House of Commons or from 
those who are responsible for the recent tactics of the Unionist 
party. Mr. Bonar Law and his colleagues seem to have 
decided to rest their case in opposing Home Rule entirely on 
the likelihood that Ulster will resist, an argument that was used 
in turn against Catholic emancipation and the disestablishment 
of the Irish church. Ulster, it seems, is always going to fight, 
and Ulster will in every case be right, to paraphrase Lord Ran- 
dolph Churchill. It cannot be denied that a part of the popu- 
lation of a portion of Ulster retains more of seventeenth century 
fanaticism than is probably to be found in any other district 
in the British empire. Even the English friends of Ulster say 
that. Nevertheless, Nationalists have the consolation of re- 
membering that none of Ulster's recent fights have reached 
serious proportions and that her contentions have hitherto 
proved to be far from right in the result. 

Since present-day Unionists base their opposition to the policy 
of Home Rule almost entirely on the probability that Ulster 
will resist, it is necessary to examine Ulster's position more 
closely. The obvious retort that Liberals use, namely, that 
the Nationalists, who constitute a large majority of the popu- 
lation, have fought in the past and may very likely fight again 
if denied Home Rule, does not go to the root of the matter. 
Perhaps the religious question is the most vital part of Ulster's 
case. Her friends deny absolutely any possibility that a Catho- 
lic Nationalist parliament would do her justice. They scorn, 
therefore, the proposals of the ministers to incorporate in their 
scheme any reasonable safeguards against injustice that the 
friends of Ulster may suggest. Indeed, the present leaders of 
the Unionist party, apparently forgetting that the Home Rule 
bill, should it pass into law, will have the whole power of the 
empire to enforce it, have formed the habit of speaking in dis- 
paraging terms of the provisions of a prospective law of the 
land as ''paper safeguards," intimating that they will scarcely 
be worth the paper on which they will be recorded. Unionists, 
however, do not usually justify all the prejudices of Ulster^ 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 541 

They merely cite them as facts and as in themselves a sufficient 
reason for withholding the demands of the Nationalists. 

This view might deserve more consideration had not the 
Unionist leaders, apparently despairing of arousing much 
hostility to Home Rule in England, spent the past few months in 
frantic efforts to stir up those very passions in Ulster, the exist- 
€nce of which they assign as the reason for their opposition to 
the Nationalist policy. There has been much loose talk about 
breaking laws and lynching ministers, which might be dismissed 
as unworthy of consideration had not Mr. Bonar Law himself 
said— as he tells us, with a full realization of his responsibility 
as leader of his party— first at Blenheim and later on the floor 
of the House of Commons, that should the proposed Home Rule 
bill be passed under the existing circumstances there is no length 
which Ulster might go in resisting the measure which would 
not be justifiable and which he would not support. In other 
words, should the Home Rule bill be passed into law against 
their wishes the faction at present in control of the Unionist 
party profess that they are ready to support Ulster in raising 
rebellion and offering forcible resistance to its enforcement. 
Much was said early in the summer of collecting arms and drill- 
ing men. The natural result was disorder among the laborers 
of Belfast around July 12, when the Unionist workmen under- 
took to drive all Catholics and Nationalists out of their employ- 
ment in the ship-yards. One of the largest firms in Belfast 
was obliged to suspend temporarily the operation of a large 
part of its plant on account of these disorders. The Unionist 
leaders, however, made haste to disavow these riots. The resis- 
tance they have in mind, they say, will be something more 
'^ dignified." 

After many councils a program has been made public, which 
is to be carried into effect the latter part of September. Relig- 
ious exercises are to be held on an appointed day, which all 
faithful Ulstermen are expected to attend. Later they are to 
sign a solemn league and covenant in imitation of their Scotch 
forefathers in the seventeenth century. The purport of this 
covenant is that the signers will not submit to a Dublin parlia- 



542 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

ment, that they will not be bound by its laws, and that they will 
not pay any taxes it may impose. Instead, should the min- 
isters persist in carrying their measure in spite of the covenant- 
ers, they propose to set up a provisional government in Ulster 
independent of the British parliament. Such a policy, if car- 
ried into execution, would obviously amount to treason. But 
its authors say that they have not yet rendered themselves 
liable to this charge, since this program is made contingent on 
the passage of the Home Rule bill.^ 

It is extremely unlikely that the majority of Unionists, who 
after all have little taste for lawbreaking and violence, will 
follow their leaders when the time comes to carry this program 
into effect. Only the event, however, will throw any certain 
light on that subject. In the meantime, since the wishes of 
Ulster are to become the basis of a proposed revolution, it is 
worth while to consider the political state of that province a 
little more carefully. Ulster, as is well known, is the wealthiest 
and most prosperous of the four provinces of Ireland. It con- 
tains the cities of Belfast and Londonderry and comprises the 
counties of Antrim, Armagh, Cavan, Derry, Donegal, Down, 
Fermanagh, Monaghan, and Tyrone. Of the 4,381,951 who lived 

« Since this paragraph was written the Ulster covenant has been pubhshed and 
signed. The document is milder in tone and less objectionable in content than 
the previous announcements of its proponents indicated it would be. The follow- 
ing is a copy of the covenant that was actually signed: 

"Being convinced in our consciences that Home Rule would be disastrous to the 
material well-being of Ulster as well as the whole of Ireland, subversive of our 
civil and religious freedom, destructive of our citizenship, and perilous to the unity 
of the Empire, we, whose names are undenvritten, men of Ulster, loyal subjects of 
his Gracious Majesty Iving George V., humbly relying on the God Whom our 
fathers in days of stress and trial confidently trusted, hereby pledge ourselves in 
Solemn Covenant throughout this our time of threatened calamity to stand by 
one another in defending, for ourselves and our children, our cherished position 
of equal citizenship in the United Kingdom, and in using all means which may be 
found necessary to defeat the present conspiracy to set up a Home Rule Parlia- 
ment in Ireland; and, in the event of such a Parliament being forced upon us, we 
further solemnly and mutually pledge ourselves to refuse to recognise its authority. 
In sure confidence that God wiU defend the right, we hereto subscribe our names, 
and, further, we individually declare that we have not already signed this 
Covenant." 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 543 

in Ireland in 1911, 1,578,572 resided in the province of Ulster. 
Of the 696,375 voters in Ireland in the same year, 239,787 were 
residents of that province. Belfast, its largest city, is the seat 
of Ireland's chief manufacturing industries, and Ulster is, there- 
fore, the wealthiest of the Irish provinces. Manifestly, if the 
inhabitants of Ulster were overwhelmingly opposed to Home 
Rule, to force that measure upon them would be a policy of 
doubtful wisdom. But such is not the case, and when Union- 
ists use the term ''Ulster" they do not really mean the entire 
province, but merely Belfast and its environs, particularly the 
counties of Antrim and Armagh. In the last general election' 
only 138,000 votes were cast in Ulster for the Unionist candi- 
dates as against 100,000 for those who favor Home Rule. Ulster 
sends thirty-one members to Parliament, of whom sixteen are 
Unionists, thirteen regular Nationalists, one an Independent 
Nationalist, and one a Liberal. Of the counties of Ulster, 
Armagh and Antrim (including Belfast) are overwhelmingly 
Unionist, though the Nationalists have one member from Bel- 
fast and one from Armagh. Cavan and Donegal, on the other 
hand, are overwhelmingly Nationalist, and none of their six 
seats was contested in the last election. All of the remaining 
counties are more evenly divided, in some the advocates and 
in others the opponents of Home Rule predominating. The 
county of Down might properly be added to Antrim and Armagh 
as constituting the Unionist strongholds, though in the last 
election three of its four seats were contested, and the Nation- 
alists returned one member. The total population of the three 
Unionist counties is only 902,263, and by no means all of these, 
as we have seen, are opposed to Home Rule. 

It is important to keep these facts in mind w^hen considering 
the contention of the Unionists that the liability of Ulster to 
resist ought to have greater weight in determining the policy 
of England toward Ireland than the wishes of the remainder of 

'Where there was no contest I have counted the total vote in the constituency 
in favor of the party that returned the member, which ought to work out in favor 
of the Unionists since their members represent constituencies with a larger voting 
population than the Nationahsts. 



544 THE AMERICAN POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEW 

the population. Unionists, as we have seen, not only justify 
these prejudices on the part of the population of Belfast, but 
they are also exerting themselves to stir up passions which cer- 
tainly cannot tend to promote good feeling between the two 
contending parties in Ireland. Sir Edward Carson, a man 
prominent in Unionist councils but who has no official connec- 
tion with Ulster, is to be the first signer of the proposed cove- 
nant. On the other hand these champions of Ulster deny that 
the demands of the remaining four-fifths of the Irish people 
should be heeded. Should the Nationalists resort to violence 
in case their plea for self-government is denied, an event by no 
means unlikely under the circumstances, the Unionist proposal 
is to use effective coercive measures. It seems scarcely believ- 
able that the responsible leaders of a great political party, 
acting apparently from sincere motives, should commit them- 
selves to propositions so inconsistent and so illogical. The 
result is a situation the serious character of which everybody 
recognizes. The ministers offer to adopt any reasonable pro- 
visions for securing the interests of Ulster that its inhabitants 
may suggest. But the Ulstermen decline to consider such pro- 
posals and demand that the Home Rule bill be given up entirely. 
The only course open to Mr. Asquith and his colleagues, there- 
fore, is to proceed with their measure, trusting that on this occa- 
sion as in 1829 and 1869, the loud talk of the partizans of Ulster 
will not be translated into deeds. 

The present program of the government is to pass the Gov- 
ernment of Ireland bill through its final stages in the House of 
Commons immediately after Parliament reassembles in October, 
The House of Lords, it is expected, will either disagree with it 
or ignore it. The result in either case will be a delay of two 
years by the end of which time the bill must have been passed 
twice more in practically its present form if it is to become a 
law. In case the bill shall pass through all these stages it is 
safe to assume that it will become a law, in spite of the hints of 
the revival of the royal veto that are heard now and then from 
the Unionist press. Should the present House of Commons 
survive its allotted time there is little doubt that Ireland 



THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE HOME RULE QUESTION 545 

will win her fight for national existence in the near future. In 
fact, the fight is won already, for no discriminating observer 
affects to believe that a majority of the British people are any 
longer hostile to the policy of Home Rule. Its adoption in 
some form seems to be only a matter of time. 

Nevertheless, it does not require great powers of political 
discernment to see that the fate of the third Home Rule bill is 
as yet uncertain. Mr. Asquith's government has already car- 
ried such far-reaching measures as old age pensions, the budget 
of 1909, the parliament act, and national insurance. There 
are now pending in Parliament bills for disestablishing the church 
in Wales and for inaugurating a system of manhood suffrage. 
It is likely that in the next few months a scheme for taxing land 
values and for some sort of a reform of the land system will be 
brought forward. Each of these measures, however meritorious 
it may be, has inevitably alienated some of the support- 
ers of the ministry. An administration that undertakes legis- 
lation of this stupendous character naturally has an uncertain 
future. It is not unhkely, therefore, that the Government of 
Ireland Bill of 1912 may meet the fate of its predecessors of 
1886 and 1893. But there seems to be no present possibility 
that the bill itself will meet with any serious opposition from a 
majority of the British electorate. 



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